NCA refutes allegations on Afriwave contract

The National Communications Authority (NCA) has refuted allegations raised by local think tank firm IMANI Ghana which sought to question the integrity of the process that led to the award of an interconnect clearinghouse license by the country’s telecom regulator to a local private IT firm Afriwave Telecom. IMANI alleged that the process period was too short for a proper evaluation of tenders, that Afriwave was given scores higher that the highest score attainable in some sections, and that Afriwave lacked the expertise and experience for the clearinghouse job, among other things.

NCA, in a statement made available to the Biztechafrica, said the claims from IMANI Ghana making the rounds in the media regarding a contract awarded to Afriwave Telecom for the provision of ICT services including monitoring of international traffic and revenue assurance are misleading and baseless.

According to the statement, upon an open invitation for applications for a licence to operate Clearinghouse services in Ghana, on 2nd December, 2014, the NCA received five applications for a Clearinghouse licence from Afriwave Telecom Ghana Limited, Channel IT, Global Voice Group, Prodigy Ghana Limited and Subah Infosolutions Ghana Limited.

It revealed that after a comprehensive and transparent evaluation of the bids of the five applicants on the 23rd January, 2015 the NCA Board of Directors considered the evaluation report and the recommendations contained therein and endorsed the said recommendations. “The Board duly adjudged Afriwave Ghana Limited as the winner of the Clearinghouse licence. Afriwave Ghana Limited, a wholly owned Ghanaian Company with Laurisia Associates as its integration partner, Huawei and Muecci as its technology partners won the bid to be licensed as the Clearinghouse Services Provider in Ghana for the next ten years. Afriwave provided the most satisfactory responses against four other competitive applicants,” it stated.

It however concluded that IMANI based their arguments on a draft report prepared by the NCA which transposed the scores from Excel to Microsoft Word and noticed that there were some transpositional errors which were corrected to correspond with the original Excel scores.

“We wish to state that the NCA, in compliance with the regulations mandating it, ensured that every aspect of the process was adhered to.

Finally, the NCA wishes to state that its commitment to the people and Government of Ghana is paramount in all its activities. The Authority takes this opportunity to once again inform the general public that its doors are always open to share information in line with its communication policies.”

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